From St. Clair, in the canton of that name, arrondissement of Pont L’Evêque, where the site of the seignorial castle is still discernible. “This Norman village has bestowed its name upon a Scottish family, an English town, an Irish county, a Cambridge college, a Royal Dukedom, and a King-at-Arms.” - Isaac Taylor's Words and Places. The Sire de St. Clair is mentioned by Wace at the battle of Hastings. “This was Richard de St. Clair, who held lands in Suffolk 1086 (Domesday). Britel de St. Clair, his brother, held in Somerset (Ibid.) William de St. Clair, probably a son of Britel, held in Dorset, 1130 (Rot. Pip.), and had a grant from David I. of Scotland of Rosslyn in Midlothian, whence descended the great house of St. Clair, Earls of Orkney and Caithness, etc.” - The Norman People. Besides William, another-of the family sought his fortunes in Scotland, Henry de St. Clair, whom we find styled “Vicecomes”of Richard de Morville, Constable of Scotland, in 1160, and was the founder of the house of Herdmanston, now represented by Lord Sinclair. But it is to the branch seated at Rosslyn that belongs the chief illustration of the race.

A namesake and descendant of the first Lord of Rosslyn formed one of that gallant company - so dear to all Scottish hearts - that went with Lord James Douglas in 1330 on his pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre with the heart of King Robert Bruce, and fell with him in battle against the Moors of Spain. “Douglas endeavoured to cut his way through the ranks of the Infidels, and in all proba­bility would have succeeded, had he not turned again to rescue Sir William St. Clair of Rosslyn, whom he saw in jeopardy. In attempting this, he was inextricably involved with the enemy. Taking from his neck the casket which contained the heart of Bruce, he cast it before him, and cried with a loud voice, “Now pass onward as thou wert wont, and Douglas will follow thee or die!”

The action and the sentiment were heroic, and they were the last words and deeds of an heroic life; for Douglas fell overpowered by his enemies, and three of his knights, and many of his companions, were slain with their master.” - Tytler. Another William de St. Clair, his successor, married Isabel, daughter and eventually sole heir of Malise, seventh Earl Palatine of Stratherne, and Earl of Orkney and Caithness. She traced her descent, through a long line of Scandinavian sovereigns, from Rognavald, Jarl of Mæren, to whom, in recompense of good service done in aiding him to obtain the crown of Norway, Harold Harfager granted in 875 the islands of Orkney and Shetland, then only recently added to his kingdom. Rognavald at once passed them to his son Sigurd, the first Jarl of Orkney. Like his younger brother Hrolf the Ganger, Duke of Normandy, Sigurd was a born conqueror, and could not rest within the narrow limits of his island home, but spread his dominion over the whole of Northern Scotland, extending his boundary as far as the Southern border of Moray, where he built a “borg”or fort. It was while returning from one of these forays that he met his death. He had set out on an expedition against “Melbrigd with the tooth”(probably the Maormar of Mar of Scottish legend), had overthrown and slain him, and was riding home in triumph with his foeman’s head dangling by his horse’s side: every man of his following having, in like manner, the head of a Scotsman slung to his saddle strap, in token of victory. But in this grim trophy Sigurd was unconsciously carrying his own doom; for the fang tooth that had given Melbrigd his by-name chanced to strike the bare calf of his leg, inflicting a hurt of which he died. He was buried with great honours (“how-laid”in the Northman’s phrase) beneath a how or haugr near the river Oykel in Sutherland. Torp-Eynar, his brother -”Eynar, the turf-cutter,” who first taught his islanders to burn peat - reigned in his stead, and is remembered in Scandinavian story for having offered his foeman Halfdane in sacrifice to Odin; scoring the murderous “blood eagle”on his bare back with his own sword. His posterity continued in the male line till about the middle of the thirteenth century. “To the last, the successors of the first Earl, Sigurd - from 875 to 1231 - displayed all the characteristics of their race; and under them the story of the Orkneys was as wild and stormy as that of the neighbouring Norse lands - Norway itself, Iceland, or Faroe. The earls fell, stabbed or burnt in their drinking halls, trapped in their 'borgs’ on the main-land, or in battle by sea or shore. Few died the ‘cow’s death’ in their beds so dreaded by the earlier sons of Thor and Odin.” - Quarterly Review, No. 283. They held Orkney of Norway and Caithness of Scotland, but remained more than half independent. “They had precedence of all the Norwegian nobles, and their title was the only hereditary one permitted in Norway to a subject not of the blood royal.” - Ibid. They kept hospitable state in their sea-girt strongholds; for though the Saga tells us, “they were wont every summer to go over to Caithness, up into the forests, to hunt the red deer and rein deer,” their principal halls were in Orkney, where they gathered round them, at the great Yule feast, followers and kinsmen from Iceland, Denmark, and England. They remained heathen till 995, when Olaf Tryggwysson came over from Norway with a mighty fleet, and - himself a newly-made Christian - enforced baptism on them by threatening to “send fire and sword throughout the Orkneys"; a summary mode of conversion that he had already practised with success at home. Nevertheless, the Earl (Sigurd Hlodverson, the grandson of Thorfinn “the skull-splitter,” who afterwards became the son-in-law of Malcolm II., King of Scotland), “hardened his mind against him, and refused to leave the faith of his kinsmen and forefathers, because he did not know better counsels than they. By the Earl’s side stood his young son, whose name (or by-name) was Hoelp or Hundi (whelp or hound). Suddenly Olaf sprang forward, seized the boy, and dragged him to the fore part of the ship. There he drew his sword, and swore that he would kill Hoelp before his father’s eyes, unless Sigurd would listen to the preaching of the blessed message. The Earl cared more for his son than for the faith of his forefathers. He submitted and was baptised, and so were all the people of the Orkneys.” Vide The Orkneyinga Saga, Quarterly Review, No. 283. His new faith sat lightly upon him, for this very Sigurd fell fighting against the Christian Brian Boroimh at the famous battle of Clontarf, where, in Dasent’s words, “the old and the new faiths met in the lists face to face for their last struggle,” and Odin himself, “riding an apple-grey horse and holding a halberd in his hand,” was seen, on the eve of the conflict, arrayed under his own raven banner.

His son Thorfinn was, like himself, a Norseman of the true old type, “greedy of wealth and renown,” who over-ran and plundered Scotland “all the way south to Fife:" but in the next generation save one recorded in these strange annals, we find a canonized saint. Sigurd’s grandsons, Paul and Erlend, who received Harold Hardrada on his way to England, and went with him to the fatal field of Stamford Bridge, divided the Orkneys between them, and were succeeded by their sons Hakon and Magnus, who had in their turn to follow a Norwegian king to a disastrous battle. They were at the great sea-fight in Anglesea Sound, when King Magnus Barefoot encountered the two mighty Norman Earls of Chester and Shrewsbury. But “when the men took up their arms and buckled for the fight, Magnus Erlendson sat down on the foredeck and did not take up his arms,” declaring he had no cause of quarrel against any one there. The King scornfully ordered him to go below, and not lie among other people’s feet if he dared not fight; but Magnus refused to shelter himself, and taking out his psalter, sat, with the javelins whizzing around him, singing psalms all through the din and fury of the battle. This was the famous St. Magnus, loved and revered as the chosen patron of the Orcades, whose name became a household word in his native land, and in whose honour a stately cathedral was raised at Kirkwall: the “first of his house to accept the Christian teaching and act upon its precepts,” a man “of blameless life, victorious in battles, wise, eloquent, and liberal.” He was treacherously put to death by his cousin Hakon, who coveted his share of the Earldom. They had agreed upon a friendly conference to adjust their differences, but Hakon broke faith by appearing at the meeting with eight well-manned war-ships; and Magnus, when he found his men outnumbered, refused to allow them to draw their swords in his defence, crying, “I will not put your lives in jeopardy for mine;” and knelt in prayer, awaiting his fate. Hakon repented of the foul deed, went on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and first commenced building the great “stone minster”dedicated to the murdered saint.

With these two cousins the male line of the house appears to have terminated, j for Paul's grand-daughter Margaret carried the Earldom, as her marriage portion, to Madoch, Earl of Athole (brother to King Malcolm Canmore), with whose posterity it remained till the early part of the fourteenth century, when Isabel, heiress to Earl Magnus, again transferred it to her husband Malise, sixth Earl Palatine of Stratherne. Her son, the next Earl, left only daughters behind him; and of these, Isabel, already mentioned as the wife of William de St. Clair, survived all the rest, and became the sole representative. Accordingly, in her right, Henry de St. Clair, her son, claimed and obtained the Earldom of Orkney, which was granted to him in 1379 by Haco King of Norway, as heir to the old Scandinavian Earls. Shetland had been separated from it nearly two hundred years before by King Skerrir, and remained under the dominion of the Crown of Norway. The next Earl, his son Henry, added greatly to his domain. He was Lord of Nithsdale and Hereditary Sheriff of Dumfries in right of his wife, the Fair Maid of Nithsdale, heiress of the Black Douglas and the Princess Egidia, daughter of King Robert II., “a mirrour of rare and singular beauty,” who was accounted the fairest woman of her age. But in the ensuing generation, the Orkneys, having been pledged for the dowry of James III.’s Norwegian bride, the Princess Margaret, came under the suzerainty of Scotland, and William, third Earl of Orkney, had to surrender his princely fief to the King.

It was annexed to the Crown in 1470: and James gave him, in exchange for all his rights, the lands of Dysart and Ravensheuch, and the castle of Ravenscraig in Fife, with the title of Earl of Caithness, never till then borne by the St. Clairs. It seemed but a poor equivalent to receive in exchange for such a birthright; and one of his descendants, the third Lord Caithness, lost his life in a desperate attempt to regain possession of Orkney. They had held their great Scandinavian Earldom for nearly one hundred years; “long enough to blend much wild Norse superstition with the traditions of their ancient house; and the tomb-fires of earlier days have their representative in the mysterious light that, on certain occasions, wrapped Rosslyn in flame Blazed battlement and pinnet high, Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair: So still they blaze, when death is nigh The lordly line of high St. Clair.”

The newly-made Earl of Caithness was twice married: first to Lady Elizabeth Douglas, a grand-daughter of Robert III. of Scotland, who brought him an heir: but he chose to leave his estates to the sons of his second wife, for the younger of whom he obtained a fresh grant of his new Earldom in 1476. Sir Oliver St. Clair thus inherited the recently-acquired lands in Fife, with Rosslyn, which had been the cradle of the race, and William succeeded as second Earl of Caithness, and was the ancestor of the present and fifteenth Earl. His de­scendants, in the male line, have now held their title for more than four hundred years. Once, and once only, it appeared to have slipped out of their possession. George, sixth Earl, died childless and ruined in 1676, having made over the whole of his property “in consideration of his debts” to his principal creditor. Sir John Campbell of Glenorchy, who, becoming thus possessed of the lands, sought and obtained the title by a fresh creation in 1677. But another George St. Clair, a cousin of the last spendthrift Earl, came forward and proved his right to the dignity, and to him Sir John had to relinquish the Earldom, receiving as a compensation the title of Earl of Breadalbane. Sir Oliver St. Clair’s posterity was not nearly so long-lived, for the last male heir died about the middle of the last century, having sold his ancestral castle of Rosslyn to the Master of Sinclair in 1735.

The disinherited elder son spent his life in one long contest with his more favoured brothers, and succeeded in wresting Dysart and Ravensheuch from Sir Oliver, and obtaining from both a formal recognition of his undoubted right to be considered the head of the family. His son Henry, who fell at Flodden Field, received in 1488 the Barony of Sinclair, which was held by his successors till 1676, when John, seventh Lord, left an only daughter and heir, Catherine, styled, in Scottish fashion, the Mistress of Sinclair. She gave her hand to her namesake, John St. Clair of Herdmanston; and thus, after the lapse of five centuries, reunited the two houses that had sprung from a common stock. Their son obtained a fresh patent of his grandfather’s peerage from Charles II.; but in the next generation the Master of Sinclair, having engaged in the rising of 1715, lost the title by attainder: and it continued dormant till 1782, when it was adjudged to the male heir, Charles St. Clair of Herdmanston, whose family now hold it.

The Earls of Rosslyn descend from Catherine, the second daughter of Henry, eighth Lord Sinclair, and the wife of Sir John Erskine of Alva. All her six brothers died without issue; and her grandson, James, eventually inherited Rosslyn and Dysart from the son of her elder sister Grizel. This young Erskine was, through his mother, Janet Wedderburn, the nephew of the celebrated Lord Chancellor Loughborough, who, having no children of his own, seems to have adopted him as his heir. Each title that was granted to him by the Crown was granted with remainder to James Erskine; and it was probably in view of this intended reversion that he selected for the Earldom he received in 1801 the name of the old St. Clair castle which at that time belonged to the latter. Accordingly, on his death four years afterwards, his nephew (then styled Sir James St. Clair Erskine) succeeded as second Earl of Rosslyn, and was the grandfather of the present peer.

Numerous branches of the St. Clairs remained in England. They were among the principal landowners of Somerset in the time of Edward I. At Tudwell in Devonshire they “had a noble Mansion, and flourished for many Descents. The last of them, Gabriel St. Cleere, having spent his Estate in riotous Living, pulled down the House, and sold it by Piece Meals as he wanted it, saying, That neither he nor his Posterity could prosper, so long as one stone lay upon another in that House, where so many Sins had been committed.” - Magna Britannia. Achard de St. Clair held two fees of the Honour of Belvoir in Leicestershire (Liber Niger). John Seintclere of Lubbenham in the same county was outlawed for felony in 1367. In Sussex they held Firle till the fifteenth century, and gave their name to Heighton-St. Clere. Guido de St. Clair was Sheriff of Cambridgeshire, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28 Ed. III. In Norfolk, “Hamo de St. Cler is mentioned in the Pipe Rolls of Henry II. Gerebert de St. Cler, whose chief seat was at Bradfield St. Cler in Suffolk, held of the Peverels in 1204, and Guy de St. Cler was Escheator of Norfolk and Suffolk 29 Ed. III. Sir Philip de St. Cler died in Henry IV.’s time, Lord of Bradfield and Wetherfield in Suffolk, leaving two sons; John, s. p. and Thomas, who died 17 Henry VI., leaving three daughters and coheirs, Elizabeth, Alianore, and Editha.” - Blomfield. Camden tells us that, at the siege of Bridgenorth Castle “King Henry the Second was like to have lost his life by an arrow, which being shot at him, was intercepted by a truly gallant man and lover of his Prince, Hubert de Saint-Clere, who sav’d the King’s life by the loss of his own.”

St clere: from a place of that name in the arrondisse­ment of Pont l’Evêque. “This Norman village has bestowed its name upon a Scottish family, an English town, an Irish county, a Cambridge college, a royal dukedom, and a King-at-Arms” (I. Taylor). The Sieur de St. Clair is named by Wace as at the Battle of Hastings. This was Richard de St. Clair, who had lands in Suffolk (Domesday). His brother Britel held lands in Somerset (ibid.). Now Sinclere or Sinclair.